Genome-wide association study of the child behavior checklist dysregulation profile.

OBJECTIVE

A potentially useful tool for understanding the distribution and determinants of emotional dysregulation in children is a Child Behavior Checklist profile, comprising the Attention Problems, Anxious/Depressed, and Aggressive Behavior clinical subscales (CBCL-DP). The CBCL-DP indexes a heritable trait that increases susceptibility for later psychopathology, including severe mood problems and aggressive behavior. We have conducted a genome-wide association study of the CBCL-DP in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

METHOD

Families were ascertained at Massachusetts General Hospital and University of California, Los Angeles. Genotyping was conducted with the Illumina Human1M or Human1M-Duo BeadChip platforms. Genome-wide association analyses were conducted with the MQFAM multivariate extension of PLINK.

RESULTS

CBCL data were available for 341 ADHD offspring from 339 ADHD affected trio families from the UCLA (N = 128) and the MGH (N = 213) sites. We found no genome-wide statistically significant associations but identified several plausible candidate genes among findings at p < 5E-05: TMEM132D, LRRC7, SEMA3A, ALK, and STIP1.

CONCLUSIONS

We found suggestive evidence for developmentally expressed genes operant in hippocampal dependent memory and learning with the CBCL-DP.